2024 Credit Union Trends in Talent Management

Last year’s troubles (including slow GDP growth, depreciation of the US dollar, and the slowing down of inflation, to name a few) continue to affect the credit union industry and the world at large. Banking experts, regulators, and customers struggled to make sense of what was happening. What can we say about credit union trends in 2024?

For credit unions, the silver lining was that they are still considered the more stable, reliable option for consumers. Though not as high as 2022 numbers, 2023 saw a rise in the number of credit union memberships. Strong job hirings was considered a major factor driving these results.

But first, North American credit unions have a big problem to solve—a growing lack of talent. In 2023, the number one problem for credit unions was attracting and retaining employees. The credit union industry has yet to recover from wave after wave of layoffs, resignations, and reallocations of their critical talent resources.

But what does that talent look like? What skills and capabilities are most likely to drive success for credit unions in 2024 and beyond?

Top Talent Trends for Credit Unions 2024

Over the past 12 months, we have conducted a deep analysis to determine which competencies were most critical to the banking industry. Our systems crawled more than 20,000 job posts for positions in North American banks and credit unions to identify the most in-demand universal competencies across the industry.

Below are the three most common competencies in banking and how they support financial services.

#1 Client Focus (54.4% in Banking Services)

Client Focus involves providing service excellence to internal and/or external clients.

Credit unions are placing greater emphasis on customer-centric approaches that prioritize strong relationship management and communication skills. With this competency, credit union employees can enhance trust and support personalized services.

Client Focus supports the delivery of a better customer experience. This competency is predictably used most common for tellers and other front-line staff who interact with customers daily. But it was also prevalent in operations, investing, and collections, implying that financial institutions recognize that every staff member plays a role in ensuring service excellence.

This also reflects the shift to digital customer-service channels such as email, chatbots, and self-serve apps. As the customer experience shifts away from in-person services, the employees who build and manage these channels must also demonstrate a client-first mentality.

#2 Attention to Detail (40.4% in Banking Services)

Attention to Detail involves working in a conscientious, consistent, and thorough manner.

Attention to Detail rose to second place within the past year. This trend shows a need for talent throughout the industry to handle every task and transaction with the most care. Organizations bear the cost of mistakes, so accuracy is vital for a thriving credit union—especially in today’s circumstances.

#3 Planning and Organization (36.7% in Banking Services)

Planning and Organization involves reaching goals that are central to organizational success by making and following plans and allocating resources effectively.

This competency is most prominent in teller services and bank operations. The ability to plan, prioritize, organize, and execute has always been essential in delivering secure, compliant, beneficial financial products to individuals and businesses. But as the technological, regulatory, economic, and financial landscape grows more complex and volatile, credit union employees must be ready to identify priorities and make tough choices about where to expend precious resources of time, energy, and budget.

Defining Credit Union Talent with Competencies

Competencies can help credit unions overcome their talent challenges by supporting greater clarity, inclusivity, and visibility to talent management processes.

Clarity

Competencies bring greater clarity to the task of identifying the talent you need because they are more effective and actionable than skills statements and other descriptors. Instead of focusing on what a person typically does on the job, competencies describe how an effective worker achieves success.

Most importantly, competencies describe those successful behaviors in terms that are objective and observable, which gives the whole workplace—from a new hire to an executive employee—a shared language for discussing and understanding workplace requirements and performance.

Inclusivity

Competencies are structured to be objective and reduce the effects of inherent bias by putting the focus on the visible behaviors of successful performers, identifying what they do and how they do it. This helps people leaders hire the best fit for a role and promote the most qualified individuals.

The best competencies are also reviewed by human experts to ensure they are gender neutral and culturally appropriate.

Visibility

Competencies make talent more visible by providing a deeper level of detail about how successful employees get the job done. At a time when credit unions are faced with the need to quickly form cross-functional teams to tackle new projects, competencies make it easier to look beyond the roles that employees currently perform and see the underlying employee strengths that could enhance an agile team.

Moving Credit Unions Forward in 2024

This is a pivotal time for credit unions. While the industry is facing a significant talent crunch, the organizations that are able to define, attract, and retain the talent they need have an unprecedented opportunity to support their mission and attract new members. Competency-based talent practices can help mission-based organizations clarify their talent requirements and make better use of the talent they have.